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The fact that you prevent it from happening doesn't change the fact that it was going to happen. of such a prediction may be limited or even impaired. However, the opportunity to detect crime before it can happen may be perceived as worth outweighing the occasional mistaken analysis of data, at least in the eyes of those who would push away the deep roots of individual rights and established jurisprudence in civilized societies, and the Constitutional rights of individuals in those societies in which the rule of law is protective of citizens. Precrime detecting is a methodology that goes beyond the forecasting that has long been a part of policing and security. That forecasting has been based on such factors as trends in criminal activity, geographical mapping of crime, and sociological and economic trends in neighborhoods. But precrime detecting relates more to prognostication and reaction to past events in making predictions, using far more behavioral data and analysis of that data, combined with patterns, statistics and other information to devise models. Spicing the mix of criminal intelligence with behavioral data will focus on such human behavior as examining people in their routines, habits, past crimes and other information to predict both the "when" and the "if" of a person's committing of a crime—and whether that person is initially under suspicion or not. Also entering this process of precrime analysis is the rampant, massive growth of social media. The data packed into social media communications may hold even more leverage for precrime detecting not only for the individuals engaged in the communications, but also in the likelihood that criminal activity will take place in a particular spot, neighborhood or area. Sociologists and psychologists say that some people can easily be creatures of habit. Thus, it is likely that a person's preferences for being in a particular place during certain behavior may be easier to predict than one might frst think. "Random" acts occur, of course, but those might be more of an exception than a rule. Take, for example, the regular meetings and evaluations that are a part of a person's parole. Such record keeping may help decisions about the amount of supervision and treatment needed for the parolee. But such data could be used even deeper to analyze why the person acts in a certain way, when that per- For precrime to function, there can't be any suggestion of fallibility. After all, who wants a justice system that instills doubt? son is likely to revert to criminal behavior, and even where that criminal behavior is probably to be staged. Offender profles and offender behavior would both be analyzed in non-traditional ways to lead to precrime detecting, combining crime data with such felds of knowledge as sociology, psychology and geography. Of course, it is no quantum leap to apply such analyses to any individual, not just an offender or a parolee. And that brings up problems involving Constitutional rights, personal privacy rights, and legal arguments about the "reasonableness" of suspicion. It also brings up questions of offcer safety in that analysis cannot violate Constitutional rights, nor should it hamper an offcer who might wrongly trust a machine, data stream or communications device rather than observe and make decisions based on professional and personal training and experience. Humans have countless more abilities in thinking than any computer. Machines do not come close to human intuition, intelligence and rational decision-making. A police offcer must use appropriate tactics and strategies to deal with a situation, adapting as necessary—something a machine cannot do. Nor should a machine "direct" an offcer to do something. Computer algorithms and predictive analysis software are developing to the extent that they may be able to forecast where and when crime might occur. But mixing in behavioral analyses takes matters further than analysis of probabilities, and even moves beyond the analysis akin to that collected by a surveillance camera at a tourist attraction, or aboard a bus or train, or at a particular facility—analysis that says what is "normal" at such places, and what is not. Aberrations from that norm might be regarded as "suspicious" behavior. On such information, deployment of extra security might be done, based on the data gathered through the cameras. That is part of the daily security decision-making at a site. However, there is a question of the step toward a more encompassing "Big Brother"-like approach that would impinge on personal and legal rights. A security camera in a public place or a place where there is no reasonable expectation of privacy www.lawandordermag.com 33